This is a story of a war between two powerful criminal gangs and their 'dons' (vory v zakone) in the communist Soviet Union. Corruption, cynical rhetorics, deaths of innocent people.

Andrey, archaeologist, historian and poet, falls in love with Rita, the mistress of the head of the mafia of a small town on the Black Sea coast of the Caucasus. They get married, but Rita does not last long with family happiness. She runs with Arthur, but he is doomed.—Bazza the Beast